Local favourite

Andy Nicholson speaks to Farr 40 owner and Mumm 30 World Champion Richard Perini

With the 2005 Rolex Farr 40 Worlds starting in Sydney next week it could be a rather short tenure of the trophy this time for Jim Richardson - the defending champion and owner/helmsman of Barking Mad. Just five months on from San Francisco and most of the key players in the fleet, plus some new additions, have reconvened at the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia.

While Richardson may be the Farr 40 class' two time winner, one of the favourites going into next week's Worlds is Sydney-based yachtsman Richard Perini. He comes into the regatta not only as local favourite but also as a World Championship holder from 2004 in the Mumm 30. Perini and his (almost all Australian) crew on Evolution have been putting much time in on their home waters, notching up wins in the pre-Christmas Rolex Trophy, the Australian Farr 40 circuit and the Australian Nationals.

The final result doesn’t really tell the full story. In the Open competition at the Nationals Jim Richardson won with the Italian 2003 World Champions Nerone coming second, pushing Evolution down the leaderboard. However, as always it was tight and with no discards in Farr 40 racing a simple mistake or poor race can end your regatta.

Just two points off the lead going into the final day Perini explains what happened: “We didn’t manage the last race very well and slipped back by ten points. We went for a higher risk start than maybe we should have - we got locked out and waved everyone else goodbye!” Despite this Perini says his team was happy finishing third and top Australian boat.

There has been a steady increase in activity over the past weeks and the pressure and expectation will be high come next Wednesday's start. “There were four or five boats that came here straight from the San Francisco worlds,” explains Perini, “so they have been here since late October. Three of them did the Rolex series before Christmas. And over the last few weeks we have had 15 boats for the Sprint warm up regatta, then 23 for the Nationals last weekend. 28 are entered for the Worlds and I am sure they will all do the pre-Worlds.”

The dock at the CYCA is now looking quite impressive with all the boats lined up in a row, but it’s the people that make the event says Perini: “It’s quite fabulous down at the club. There is an unbelievable amount of sailing talent in town at the moment.”


The winning crew after the Rolex Trophy

Perini’s crew is no exception with New Zealander Hamish Pepper on tactics, Darren Jones on mainsheet, Jason Rowed as trimmer and top youth match racer Michael Dunstan as second trimmer to name but a few. Five of his Farr 40 crew sail on his Mumm 30 Foreign Affair too.

Perini feels that while the 40 and the 30 are quite different boats to sail the main benefit comes from regular competition at a high level. He is also a fan of tiller steering and was one of the first owners to convert his 40 from having a wheel. “Our first boat [five years ago] had a wheel, but we changed it over after a year,” comments Perini. “There are pros and cons to both, but for me I had never had a boat with a wheel before - so that helped. A tiller is more comfortable compared to the wheel - you never want to steer standing up all day. I find also that I can lock in much better with the tiller especially going upwind and more than anything it just helps to keep the helm still!”

Having two campaigns running also results in a faster learning curve when it comes to approaching big regattas in the right way. Perini says that he learnt a good lesson a couple of years back when all the pieces seemed to be in place for a good result in the Mumm 30 but it wasn’t forthcoming. “We anlaysed that pretty hard - on where things went wrong - and we seemed to have corrected that,” he comments.

Their Sydney-based Farr 40 programme has been quite intensive since finishing 15th in San Francisco last year. Crew fitness has been a focus he says, with the aim being to carry some momentum though to the end of the regatta. They have been training on the water with Lang Walker's team on Kokomo and have also been doing some private tuning work of their own. Perini has another Farr 40 (which has been chartered out for the Worlds) and he says that they have used his two boats to work “pretty hard” on rig set up and tuning. “We did do a fairly intensive session about a month ago with the two boats. The weather didn’t cooperate too well but we did get a fair bit out of it.”



With the regatta being held at the start of March Perini advises that there will be much more variation in the weather and he suggests that everyone will be carrying their light jibs. “The chance of getting 20+ knots is pretty low. It’s the time of year where it is quite hard to predict what you are going to get - usually by March the good nor-easters are towards the end of their programme. In the summer they would build regularly to 22-23 knots but now that is not likely to happen.”

Conditions he says could be unsettled. Last week they experienced an unusual 24 knot gradient northerly, but Perini thinks the Championship is more likely to be sailed in the 10 to 15 knots range.

So no more 3+ jibs then? “It hasn’t been thrown in the bin, but it’s been retired” is Perini comment. Many of the teams in San Francisco dropped the light jib and used the sail allocation for a newly designed intermediate jib to go between the code 3 and the code 4 for the expected breezy and short - choppy conditions. “I think sometimes there are things that you can just spend money on, because the other bloke’s got one! I think it may have been the right jib in San Francisco for a couple of races maybe.”

Back to Sydney and Perini thinks that there are four or five good Australian boats to watch. The first up is Marcus Blackmore with Emotional Hooligan. “They have been a little bit off top form for the season but they could come back, and they have always been quick here in Sydney and the boat to beat,” he says.

Also in the frame he says are Matt Allen’s Ichi Ban, while a newcomer to the fleet he has a strong team onboard, while another big name is Neville Crichton, currently 'between' maxis with his 40 Shockwave. Michael Coxon will be his tactician. John Calvert-Jones’ Southern Star have what Perini describes as a “pile of talent” onboard including Alinghi's Grant Simmer and Colin Beashel.

When it comes to the overseas entries, then Perini singles out Barking Mad and Nerone. “I think Barking Mad did an absolutely amazing job in San Francisco and they are still far and away the boat to beat here…them and Nerone.”

However when the chips are down he believes that a winner could come from any of the top 15 candidates.

And what of their prospects? “Given our current form I would say we are giving ourselves a chance, but there are 15 boats in with a chance…So who to pick…there is a lot of talent there. We are happy, but we are under no illusions. It’s going to be a very tough thing to do.We are going in there as prepared as anybody but there is a lot of sailing to get through,” comments Perini.

With all the intense preparation in the lead up to the event Perini jokes that he been able to make it into the office a couple of times this month. Aged 49, his business is in private equity investment: “I am fortunate that I have some good people and that I can leave them to it most of the time.” He is married with two children - who both race Lasers, with one making the step up to a 29er.

Following the Rolex Farr 40 Worlds it will be back into the Mumm 30 and over to Europe for the summer. He is in the Australian Admiral’s Cup team (Offshore? “I’m not really looking forward to that bit!”) and will prior to that, compete at the Mumm 30 Worlds in France.

He seems taken with the ease of competing with a small team in the Mumm 30 around the world, and does not see himself as a TP52 owner-in-waiting. “No, I don’t have any interest there with the 52s. The style of racing will be fantastic, but I can’t see it happening in Australia. I don’t have any interest in running a boat like that overseas - it’s not quite my scene.” The Farr 40 on home turf is, however, most definitely his scene.